Twitter blocks NYT account, restores later

New York: Twitter blocked a New York Times account for almost 24 hours last weekend, saying a tweet violated the micro-blogging website’s rules against hateful conduct.

The tweet by @nytimesworld – the account of the international reporting team — had promoted an article about Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s apology to indigenous people in two provinces.

The post read: “Left out of an apology a decade ago, native people in Newfoundland and Labrador get an apology from Justin Trudeau”.

Taking cognisance of it, Twitter blocked @nytimesworld for 24 hours from Saturday till Sunday.

Twitter later restored the account, apologising “for any inconvenience this may have caused”.

“After reviewing the account, it appears one of our agents made an error,” Twitter told NYT late on Sunday.

The New York Times international reporting team uses Twitter to promote its coverage to nearly two million followers, usually posting 50 to 100 tweets a day.

Earlier in November, US President Donald Trump’s Twitter account was brought down for 11 minutes.

Later, in a series of tweets issued by Twitter’s Government and Elections team, they attributed this incident to a rogue employee on his last day in office.

-IANS